John Roberts http://www.pfaw.org/
Thu, 24 Jul 2014 12:52:29 -0400Thu, 24 Jul 2014 13:01:30 -0400Right Wing Gets It: Elections Matter Because Courts Matterhttp://www.pfaw.org/content/right-wing-gets-it-elections-matter-because-courts-matter
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<p>For right-wing advocates, <a href="http://blog.pfaw.org/content/another-damaging-supreme-court-term">big conservative wins in the Supreme Court&rsquo;s recently completed term</a> have only confirmed the importance of electing a president in 2016 who will give them more justices in the mold of Samuel Alito and John Roberts.&nbsp; The Roberts and Alito nominations, and the conservative majority created by their confirmations, represent the triumph of a decades-long push by right-wing funders, big business, conservative political strategists, and legal groups to take ideological dominion of all levels of the federal judiciary.</p>
<p>Right-wing groups have long made attacks on the federal judiciary a staple of their rhetoric. Many claim America&rsquo;s decline began with Supreme Court rulings against required prayer and Bible readings in public schools in the 1960s. Roe v. Wade, and more recently, judicial rulings in favor of marriage equality, have been characterized as &ldquo;judicial tyranny&rdquo; and &ldquo;judicial activism.&rdquo; Of course right-wing legal groups have been pushing hard for their own form of judicial activism, and have pushed Republican presidents to nominate judges they can count on.&nbsp;</p>
<p>As Jeffrey Toobin notes in <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/06/30/the-absolutist-2">a recent profile of presidential hopeful Sen. Ted Cruz</a> in the New Yorker,</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Conservatives like Cruz never stopped denouncing liberals for their efforts to use the courts to promote their ideological agenda, even as they began to do much the same thing themselves. The heart of Cruz&rsquo;s legal career was a sustained and often successful undertaking to use the courts for conservative ends, like promoting the death penalty, lowering the barriers between church and state, and undermining international institutions and agreements.</p>
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<p>Right-wing activists are proud of what they have accomplished, as Richard Land, long-time leader of the Southern Baptist Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission<a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/magazine/the-culture-warrior-in-winter-20140710">, told National Journal</a>&rsquo;s Tiffany Stanley.&nbsp; As Brian Tashman <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/richard-land-alito-and-roberts-are-gifts-keep-giving">reports</a> in RWW, Land &ldquo;waxed nostalgic for the days when President Bush was in office&hellip;and especially for Bush&rsquo;s commitment to nominating ultra-conservative federal judges.&rdquo;</p>
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<p>&nbsp;&ldquo;Alito and Roberts are the gifts that keep on giving, and we would have gotten neither one of those without our involvement,&rdquo; Land said, predicting that <em>Roe v. Wade</em> will soon be &ldquo;thrown onto the ash heap of history.&rdquo;</p>
<p>&hellip;The Supreme Court&rsquo;s ruling this year in the <em>Hobby Lobby </em>case shows the Religious Right&rsquo;s strong focus on the judiciary is paying off. &nbsp;And Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council told Stanley that conservatives will continue to use the courts as part of their strategy to keep &ldquo;the barbarians at bay.&rdquo;</p>
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<p>But in spite of their wins, and their success in creating the <a href="http://www.pfaw.org/media-center/publications/rise-corporate-court-how-supreme-court-putting-businesses-first">most pro-corporate Court since the New Deal</a>, right-wing activists are nervous that some of their big wins, like Hobby Lobby and Citizens United, were 5-4 decisions. They want to pad their majority and continue their march to remake America via the courts.</p>
<p><strong>The Senate</strong></p>
<p>Since federal judges have to be confirmed by the Senate, right-wing groups are also using the Supreme Court in 2014 Senate campaigns. An anti-choice PAC, Women Speak Out, followed the Hobby Lobby ruling almost immediately with <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/supreme-court-rulings-to-reverberate-in-midterm-elections-this-fall/2014/07/02/562fce06-0169-11e4-b8ff-89afd3fad6bd_story.html">attacks on Mark Pryor</a> and other Democrats for not having supported the confirmation of Samuel Alito.</p>
<p>On the day of the Court&rsquo;s decisions in Hobby Lobby and Harris v. Quinn, North Carolina House Speaker Thom Tillis, a Republican, who is challenging U.S. Sen. Kay Hagan, a Democrat, <a href="https://twitter.com/ThomTillis/status/483644340195954688">tweeted</a> &ldquo;Today&rsquo;s SCOTUS rulings were a win for our 1st Amendment freedoms, a loss for Hagan, Obama, & DC bureaucrats.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Cleta Mitchell, a lawyer who represents right-wing groups, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/supreme-court-rulings-to-reverberate-in-midterm-elections-this-fall/2014/07/02/562fce06-0169-11e4-b8ff-89afd3fad6bd_story.html">told the Washington Post</a>, &ldquo;These Supreme Court decisions, it&rsquo;s a reminder to people on our side of the aisle of the importance of the court, and then the importance of recapturing the Senate.&rdquo;</p>
<p><strong>Religious Liberty &lsquo;Hanging by a Thread&rsquo;</strong></p>
<p>Right-wing pundits and organizations are already ramping up their rhetoric on judges as a 2016 presidential campaign issue, with many touting the 5-4 decision in Hobby Lobby as evidence that religious liberty is &ldquo;hanging by a thread.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Rush Limbaugh went on a <a href="file:///C:/Users/Peter/Documents/PFAW/Why%20Cheer%20a%205-4%20Decision%20for%20Hobby%20Lobby?%20Freedom%20and%20Liberty%20are%20Hanging%20by%20a%20Thread!">tirade against Hillary Clinton</a> after she criticized the Hobby Lobby ruling:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Can I tell you the truth about the Hobby Lobby ruling?&nbsp; We're in such dangerous territory in terms of losing our freedom that we cheer when five out of nine people uphold the Constitution.&nbsp; We're not advancing anything, folks.&nbsp; We are barely hanging on here.&nbsp; &hellip;&nbsp; And here comes&nbsp;<a href="http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2014/07/02/nobody_can_name_anything_hillary_did_as_secstate" target="_self">Hillary Clinton thinking this decision</a>&nbsp;is a step toward the kind of anti-women policy seen in extremist undemocratic nations is outrageous.&nbsp;</p>
<p>The woman is either a blithering idiot or a total in-the-tank statist, maybe a combination of the two.&nbsp; But this is not a step toward anything.&nbsp; This is a temporary halt in the onslaught toward totalitarianism.</p>
<p>We're just barely hanging on.&nbsp; We cheer! We conservatives stand up and cheer when we manage to get five people to see it the right way.&nbsp; "Oh, my God! Oh, Lord! Thank you so much, Lord. You saved another day."&nbsp; Five people out of nine, five said the Constitution means what it says.&nbsp; The troubling thing to me is the four people that didn't!&nbsp; Liberty and freedom are hanging by a thread here!&nbsp;</p>
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<p>That theme was echoed by the <a href="http://blog.adw.org/2014/06/ok-we-won-but-the-hobby-lobby-vote-should-have-been-9-0-wake-up-america-your-liberty-is-on-the-line/">Archdiocese of Washington</a>&rsquo;s Msgr. Charles Pope:</p>
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<p>&ldquo;OK, We won. But the Hobby Lobby vote should have been 9-0. Wake up, America. Your liberty is on the line!&rdquo;</p>
<p><strong>It is simply outrageous that four Supreme Court Justices, and many Americans, cannot see</strong>&nbsp;the clear and offensive proposition of the Government in this regard&hellip;..<strong>We won today, but barely. It should have been 9&ndash;0.</strong>&nbsp;Wake up, America; your religious and other liberties are hanging by the thread of one vote.</p>
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<p>Former presidential candidate <a href="http://www.familyheritagealliance.org/Blog/Momentous%20Day%20for%20Religious%20Freedom.aspx">Gary Bauer of American Values weighed in</a> in similar fashion:</p>
<blockquote>
&ldquo;While we celebrate this victory, the fact remains that four justices on the Supreme Court, including the two appointed by Obama, evidently share his narrow view of America's first freedom and were willing to trample the religious liberty of millions of Americans in order to advance their radical pro-abortion agenda.<br />
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This narrow decision, with four liberal justices eager to go the wrong way, is a stark reminder to every man and woman of faith that their religious liberty is hanging by a thread.</blockquote>
<p><strong>The Court as Right-Wing Campaign Issue for 2016</strong></p>
<p>Right-wing pundits and presidential candidates frequently use the federal judiciary as an issue to excite base voters. Back in 2012, one of the most effective things Mitt Romney did to shore up his weak support among conservative activists was to name a judicial advisory team headed by Robert Bork. That year, Terence Jeffrey, who worked on Pat Buchanan&rsquo;s presidential campaigns and has written for right-wing publications, <a href="http://cnsnews.com/news/article/3-9-justices-will-turn-80-2016-election">wrote</a>:</p>
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Three of the nine justices on a U.S. Supreme Court that has decided many significant issues by 5-4 votes over the past decade will turn 80 years of age before the 2016 presidential election.<br />
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The three justices are Antonin Scalia, an anchor of the court&rsquo;s conservative wing, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, an anchor of the court&rsquo;s liberal wing, and Anthony Kennedy, who is often the decisive swing vote in 5-4 opinions&hellip;.</blockquote>
<p>Bobby Jindal is among the crop of potential 2016 presidential candidates who is making an issue of the courts. &nbsp;In an interview with a <a href="http://caffeinatedthoughts.com/2014/06/bobby-jindal-considering-2016-presidential-run/">conservative Christian blogger</a> during last month&rsquo;s Iowa state Republican convention, Jindal suggested if Republicans take control of the Senate this year they would block additional nominees. Asked about federal judges overturning state marriage bans for same-sex couples, Jindal said, &ldquo;&ldquo;This shows you the importance of the November elections.&nbsp; We don&rsquo;t need this President putting more liberal judges on the bench.&rdquo;</p>
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It is important, whether you are a lawyer or not, to understand what it means for the courts to actually apply the Constitution as opposed for them just to create new laws or to read things and just decide they are going to contradict what the other two branches of government did.&nbsp; We&rsquo;ve gotten away from these three separate but equal branches of government and instead we&rsquo;ve got these activist judges who are overreaching. We have to recognize the problem for what it is,&rdquo; Jindal added.<br />
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He emphasized the importance of elections and their impact on judicial confirmations because sometimes Constitutional amendments will correct the problem, and other times federal judges will just overrule them.</blockquote>
<p>Mike Huckabee has seemingly made <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2014/06/mike-huckabee-march-for-marriage-gay-marriage-supreme-court-108085.html">attacks on the judiciary</a> a centerpiece of his campaign. In May, he <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/Politics/Mike-Huckabee-gay-judge-impeach/2014/05/12/id/570947/">called for the impeachment of an Arkansas judge</a> who ruled in favor of marriage equality. Last year, urging Senate Republicans to block an Obama appeals court nominee, he <a href="http://www.mikehuckabee.com/2013/7/oppose-cornelia-pillard">said</a>, &ldquo;Judges can linger on for decades after a President leaves office, and a bad one can wreak havoc that echoes down the ages.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Meanwhile, presidential contender Rick Santorum and the right-wing Judicial Crisis Network are attacking Chris Christie for <em>not</em> sufficiently making right-wing ideology a litmus test for his state judicial appointments.&nbsp; <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/christie-s--judge-problem--will-be-a-lingering-concern-among-conservatievs-if-he-runs-for-president-212804833.html">Santorum told Yahoo News earlier this month</a>, &ldquo;To see a record as abysmal as Gov. Christie&rsquo;s record in the state of New Jersey, I guarantee you that will be a red flag for most voters in the state of Iowa, but also most voters in the Republican primary.&rdquo;&nbsp;(Earlier this month, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/17/chris-christie-hobby-lobby_n_5597468.html">while in Iowa</a> campaigning for Gov. Terry Branstad, <a href="http://www.newsmax.com/US/Christie-Hobby-Lobby-court-ruling/2014/07/18/id/583483/">Christie said he supports the Court&rsquo;s Hobby Lobby decision</a>; he had initially declined to say whether he supported the decision.) &nbsp;</p>
<p>The Judicial Crisis Network has also slammed Christie, saying his failure to &ldquo;deliver on judicial activism&rdquo; may have doomed his 2016 presidential hopes. It has created an entire website devoted to trashing Christie&rsquo;s judicial record to conservative voters:&nbsp; <a href="http://www.christiebadonjudges.com/">www.christiebadonjudges.com</a>. In June, Fox News ran <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2014/06/09/christie-didnt-deliver-on-judicial-activism-has-doomed-his-2016-bid/">an op ed by JCN&rsquo;s Carrie Severino</a> using Christie&rsquo;s alleged failure to appoint right-wing ideologues to the state supreme court as a way to discredit him with conservative activists.</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Christie didn&rsquo;t deliver on judicial activism. Has he doomed his 2016 bid?</p>
<p>If a candidate&rsquo;s tenure as governor is his road-test for the presidency, Governor Chris Christie just flunked.</p>
<p>As a candidate for governor, Christie talked the talk on judges, vowing to "remake" the New Jersey Supreme Court and to transform the most activist court in the nation into one that operates under the rule of law.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Despite having the opportunity to appoint four of seven justices on the court since taking office, Christie has repeatedly nominated individuals with no discernible judicial philosophy&hellip;.</p>
<p>And while elected representatives must stand for re-election every few years, federal judges sit for life.&nbsp;</p>
<p>Today&rsquo;s nominee could still be playing the same tricks in 2050 or beyond. &nbsp;That is why the issue of judges matters so much during presidential primaries and caucuses&hellip;.</p>
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<p>Right-wing advocates have been talking for a while about how important it is to their judicial plans not just to elect a Republican, but to elect a Republican committed to making the kind of Supreme Court nominations they want. In February<a href="http://mychal-massie.com/premium/scotus-critical-concern-in-2016-presidential-election/">, right-wing activist Mychal Massie complained</a> that many justices nominated by Republican presidents over the past few decades did not turn out to be ideological warriors (though that is hardly the case with more recent nominees).</p>
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<p>But forward-thinking conservatives are keenly aware that we must be concerned about the future as well, and not just because of Obama. Based on age alone, one of the primary areas of concern is that the person elected president in 2016 will potentially have at least four Supreme Court Justices to replace. Two of the potential four are liberals, so a Democrat president would simply be replacing liberals with liberals, ergo, it would be a wash. But of the other two the one is a solid Constructionist, and the other is a swing vote who has, in recent years, ruled based on Constructionism enough times that we should be concerned if a Democrat president replaces him&hellip;.</p>
<p>As you can see, the potential for the political complexion of the High Court to be changed for decades to come should be of critical concern if a Democrat wins the presidency in 2016. But, it is myopic betise on an epic level to even for an instant believe we need not be concerned if a Republican wins. Especially if it is an establishment Republican&hellip;.</p>
<p>With Karl Rove and Reince Priebus pulling the strings of the GOP and RNC, the Republican Party resembles a RINO theme park more than it does the Party true conservatives have supported.</p>
<p>With them controlling things from behind the curtain it is not just critical that the next president be &ldquo;conservative&rdquo; but he/she must be a legitimate conservative whose conservative bonafides are unimpeachable. It does conservatism no good to elect a Mitt Romney, John McCain, or Jeb Bush type. The 2016 election will place in office a person with the potential to change the face of SCOTUS for many decades to come. And as John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Mitch McConnell, et al. have showed us &mdash; it&rsquo;s not just Democrats who are betraying us.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Religious Right leaders will certainly be keeping the issue of judicial nominations at the forefront of the 2016 campaigns. This week, George O. Wood, who heads the Assemblies of God denomination, <a href="http://www.charismanews.com/opinion/44729-george-wood-4-things-pentecostals-must-do-for-religious-freedom">wrote</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Moreover, we should encourage voting because elections have consequences. One of those consequences is that the president nominates judges who serve on district and appellate courts and on the Supreme Court. The U.S. Senate must then approve those nominees. It is a sad fact that no evangelical sits on the Supreme Court&mdash;even though evangelicals constitute a very large faith community in America. I suspect that at present no evangelicals could even be nominated or confirmed to a federal bench because they hold views that are pro-life and pro-traditional marriage. People in our Fellowship need to remember that when they cast a ballot, they effectively decide who will sit as a federal judge. Indirectly, they are casting a vote for or against a robust understanding of the free exercise of religion.</p>
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Peter Montgomery2014 ElectionsBobby Jindal Carrie SeverinoChris ChristieCleta MitchellElection 2014Election 2016Gary BauerGeorge O. WoodJohn Roberts Judicial Crisis NetworkMike Huckabee Mychal Massie Republican PartyRichard Land Rick Santorum Rush Limbaugh Samuel Alito Supreme CourtTed CruzTerence JeffreyThom TillisWomen Speak OutEthics &amp; Religious Liberty Commission Fair and Just CourtsFighting the RightReligious Liberty47686Thu, 24 Jul 2014 11:52:29 -0500John Roberts Richard Land: 'Alito And Roberts Are The Gifts That Keep On Giving'http://www.pfaw.org/content/richard-land-alito-and-roberts-are-gifts-keep-giving
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<p>National Journal is <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/magazine/the-culture-warrior-in-winter-20140710">out today with a profile</a> of the new <em>kinder, gentler</em> Religious Right, looking at the <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/richard-land-announces-retirement-under-cloud-controversy-and-scandal">downfall of Richard Land&rsquo;s career</a> as a sign that the movement is turning away from aggressive culture wars and instead finding a less threatening political approach.</p>
<p>Reporter Tiffany Stanley interviewed Land, a former top Southern Baptist Convention official, who waxed nostalgic for the days when President Bush was in office&hellip;and especially for Bush&rsquo;s commitment to nominating ultra-conservative federal judges.</p>
<p>&ldquo;Alito and Roberts are the gifts that keep on giving, and we would have gotten neither one of those without our involvement,&rdquo; Land said, predicting that<em> Roe v. Wade </em>will soon be &ldquo;thrown onto the ash heap of history.&rdquo;</p>
<p>The Religious Right has found great success in rallying its supporters against the menace of &ldquo;activist judges&rdquo; while stressing the importance of putting &ldquo;strict constructionists&rdquo; on the bench. Even during Mitt Romney&rsquo;s failed presidential bid, many far-right activists told voters not to mind Romney&rsquo;s apparent attempts to move to the center since he promised to appoint hard-line conservative judges.</p>
<p>The Supreme Court&rsquo;s ruling this year in the<em> Hobby Lobby </em>case shows the Religious Right&rsquo;s strong focus on the judiciary is paying off. And Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council told Stanley that conservatives will continue to use the courts as part of their strategy to keep &ldquo;the barbarians at bay.&rdquo;</p>
<blockquote>
&ldquo;I love the guy!&rdquo; Land says. In his office, he gets up from the conference table, goes searching for his cell phone, and pulls up a photo of W. and members of the Land family&mdash;his wife, two daughters, and son-in-law&mdash;at the Bush Library, which they visited while they were in Dallas for a wedding.<br />
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Land proved a valuable presidential ally. When Bush called for preemptive action against Saddam Hussein in Iraq, he was one of the few religious leaders to provide cover, writing a letter supporting the president&rsquo;s plan with his version of just-war theory. In 2003, after Bush signed the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act into law, Land joined Falwell and other ministers in the Oval Office, where they prayed with the president. In 2004, Land launched the &ldquo;I Vote Values&rdquo; campaign, a mammoth get-out-the-vote operation, which distributed half a million voter guides to churches and included a cross-country tour in an 18-wheeler. According to exit polls, Bush won voters who said their top concern was &ldquo;moral values&rdquo; by 80 percent to 18 percent.<br />
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By his account, the alignment of religious conservatives and the GOP happened when Republicans more readily took on the antiabortion mantle: &ldquo;What I&rsquo;ve always said is &hellip; we&rsquo;re going to be values voters, we&rsquo;re going to vote our values and our beliefs and our convictions, and if that makes abortion a partisan issue, then shame on the Democrats.&rdquo; He pushed for a commitment from the GOP so evangelicals would not just be another voting bloc but a constituency whose concerns were a priority. &ldquo;One of my goals was to make certain that evangelicals weren&rsquo;t used by the GOP in the way blacks were used by the Democratic Party,&rdquo; he says.<br />
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And it&rsquo;s undeniable that the alliance with George W. Bush carried benefits for evangelicals. Look no further than the Supreme Court, Land points out. &ldquo;Alito and Roberts are the gifts that keep on giving, and we would have gotten neither one of those without our involvement,&rdquo; he says. Land predicts that, if he lives out a natural lifespan, he will see Roe v. Wade &ldquo;thrown onto the ash heap of history.&rdquo;<br />
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The Hobby Lobby case is in many ways a model for the new strategy being pursued by the Religious Right. It represents a way to engage in politics that is less aggressive than the tactics of the previous generation of believers. Back then, the key phrase was &ldquo;family values&rdquo;; now, it is &ldquo;religious liberty.&rdquo; You see it everywhere&mdash;from contraception court cases to legislation to think-tank conferences.<br />
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&ldquo;We&rsquo;re not unrealistic,&rdquo; says Perkins of the Family Research Council. &ldquo;Our focus is more keeping the barbarians at bay, really.&rdquo; His organization has started working more at the state level on freedom-of-expression laws. &ldquo;We kind of saw that coming about three years ago and began shifting a lot of our emphasis on religious liberty.&rdquo;</blockquote>
Brian TashmanC4John Roberts Richard Land Roe v. WadeSamuel Alito Supreme CourtFair and Just Courts47544Fri, 11 Jul 2014 11:00:19 -0500John Roberts Samuel Alito: A Movement Man Makes Good On Right-Wing Investmentshttp://www.pfaw.org/content/samuel-alito-movement-man-makes-good-right-wing-investments
<img class="imagefield imagefield-field_teaser_astory" width="390" height="250" alt="" src="http://www.pfaw.org/sites/default/files/images/a_story_rww/samuel_alito.jpg?1404404161" />
<p><em>This post originally appeared on <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-montgomery/samuel-alito-a-movement-m_b_5555428.html">Huffington Post Politics</a>.</em></p>
<p>Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito ended this Supreme Court session with a bang, writing the majority&nbsp; opinion in two cases that gave for-profit corporations the right to make religious liberty claims to evade government regulation and set the stage for the fulfillment of a central goal of the right-wing political movement: the destruction of public employee unions.</p>
<p>Neither of the decisions were particularly surprising. Samuel Alito is <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/05/business/pro-business-decisions-are-defining-this-supreme-court.html?_r=0">the single most pro-corporate Justice</a> on <a href="http://www.pfaw.org/media-center/publications/citizens-united-era-how-supreme-court-continues-put-business-first">the most pro-business Court since the New Deal</a>. Still, Alito&rsquo;s one-two punch was another extraordinary milestone for the strategists who have been working for the past 40 years to put business firmly in the driver&rsquo;s seat of American politics.</p>
<p>Many would suggest that the modern right-wing movement began with the failed presidential bid of Barry Goldwater. But there&rsquo;s a strong case to be made that it begins in earnest with <a href="http://www.pfaw.org/issues/government-people/edit-memo-take-back-constitution-corporate-court">a 1971 memo by Lewis Powell</a>, who argued that American businesses were losing public support and called for a massive, continuing campaign to wage war on leftist academics, progressive nonprofit groups, and politicians. The memo by Powell, who was later appointed to the Supreme Court via a nomination by Richard Nixon, inspired a few very wealth men like Adolph Coors, John M. Olin, and Richard Mellon Scaife, who set about <a href="http://www.pfaw.org/media-center/publications/buying-movement">creating and funding a massive infrastructure</a> of think tanks, endowed academic chairs, law schools and right-wing legal groups, including the Federalist Society, which has nurtured Alito&rsquo;s career.</p>
<p>Chief among the right-wing movement&rsquo;s tactics has been building sufficient political power to achieve ideological dominance over the federal judiciary. As activists like Richard Viguerie recruited foot soldiers to help win elections for the GOP, <a href="http://www.pfaw.org/media-center/publications/the-federalist-society-from-obscurity-to-power">the Federalist Society built the intellectual foundations for an extreme conservative legal movement</a> that would gain traction when its members won confirmation to the federal bench. That process began in earnest during the Reagan administration and reached new heights during the George W. Bush administration with the ascendance to the Supreme Court of John Roberts and Samuel Alito.</p>
<p>Samuel Alito was, is, and always has been a man of the movement, an ideological warrior with a clear set of goals. His commitment to achieving those goals by any means available to him is reflected in his record in the Reagan Justice Department, the White House Office of Legal Counsel, as an appeals court judge, and now as a Supreme Court justice, where he is helping to wage a legal counterrevolution aimed at reversing hard-won advances protecting workers, the environment, and the rights of women, racial and ethnic minorities, and LGBT people.</p>
<p>He remains an active part of the political and legal movement that shepherded his rise to power. The Federalist Society&rsquo;s Leonard Leo steered Alito&rsquo;s Supreme Court nomination through the White House and Senate. Alito has returned the favor, participating in numerous <a href="http://www.commoncause.org/press/press-releases/justice-alito-flouts-ethical-standards.html">events</a> for the Federalist Society even after he became a member of the Supreme Court. He has shown no concern about positioning himself as part of the movement, <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/11/17/justice-alito-defends-high-court-2010-decision-in-citizens-united-case/">telling</a> listeners at a Federalist Society dinner in 2012 that the Obama administration is promoting a vision of society &ldquo;in which the federal government towers over people.&rdquo; He has also helped raise funds at events for the right-wing American Spectator Magazine (where he <a href="http://www.humanevents.com/2008/12/05/justice-alito-pokes-fun-of-biden-at-dinner/">mocked</a> VP-elect Joe Biden), the Intercollegiate Studies Institute, and the <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2013/06/justice_samuel_alito_why_he_s_so_rude.html">Manhattan Institute</a>.</p>
<p>Alito&rsquo;s class at Princeton was the last all-male class at the university, and when Alito was angling for a promotion within the Reagan-Meese Justice Department in 1985, he bragged that he was a &ldquo;proud member&rdquo; of Conservative Alumni of Princeton, a group that aggressively fought the university&rsquo;s efforts to diversify its student body by accepting more women and people of color. (He developed a surprisingly thorough amnesia on the topic between his Justice Department days and his Supreme Court confirmation hearings.)</p>
<p>At the Justice Department, Alito was part of a team that pushed to limit civil rights protections and advance a right-wing legal ideology. Even in that hothouse of right-wing activism, he was an outlier, unsuccessfully trying to push Ronald Reagan to veto an uncontroversial bill against odometer fraud on the grounds of federalism. Alito argued that it is not the job of the federal government to protect the &ldquo;health, safety, and welfare&rdquo; of Americans. He continued to push that kind of federalism argument as a judge, dissenting from a ruling that upheld a federal law restricting the sale of machine guns. On the Third Circuit Court of Appeals he was often the lone dissenter staking out far-right interpretations of the law that consistently sacrificed the rights and interests of individuals to powerful corporate or other institutions.</p>
<p>Among the right-wing movement&rsquo;s key long-term goals &mdash;&nbsp;from the Nixon era up until today &mdash;&nbsp;has been to rig the system to prevent progressives from being able to win elections and exercise political influence. They have sought to &ldquo;defund the left&rdquo; by starving government agencies and progressive nonprofits of funds and by weakening or destroying organized labor, which is a crucial source of funding and organizing efforts for progressive causes and candidates. For example, <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/01/devos-michigan-labor-politics-gop?page=2">the DeVos family pushed anti-union &ldquo;right to work&rdquo; legislation</a> in their home state of Michigan, and &nbsp;the Koch brothers and their political networks have poured massive resources into the political arm of the movement, exemplified by politicians who, like Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, are hell-bent on the destruction of public employee unions. &nbsp;</p>
<p>Alito&rsquo;s recent decision in the <em>Harris v. Quinn</em> case was just the latest step towards that goal. In that case, Alito and his conservative colleagues invented a new employee classification in order to declare that one class of workers paid by the state are not subject to the same labor laws as other public employees. The decision was prefigured in a 2012 case, &nbsp;<em>Knox v. SEIU</em>, &nbsp;in which Alito led an attack on unions by deciding to answer a question that had not even come before them in the case. In essence, he and the other conservative justices argued that a system that allows workers to opt out of assessments for unions&rsquo; political work was suddenly unconstitutional, and required an opt-in. Justice Sotomayor slammed the Alito decision for ruling on an issue which the SEIU had not even been given an opportunity to address. That kind of right-wing activism moved People For the American Way Foundation&rsquo;s Paul Gordon to <a href="http://blog.pfaw.org/content/court-s-conservatives-join-right-wing-attack-unions">write</a> that the Court&rsquo;s conservative judges &ldquo;might as well have taken off their judicial robes and donned Scott Walker T-shirts in their zeal to make it harder for unions to protect workers.&rdquo;</p>
<p>In his <em>Harris</em> decision, Alito went out of his way to invite right-wing legal groups to bring a more far-reaching case, one that would finally give him and his pro-business colleagues an opportunity to take a sledgehammer to public employee unions by eliminating, in the name of the First Amendment, the requirement (specifically upheld by the Supreme Court over 30 years ago) that workers benefitting from a collective bargaining agreement help pay for the costs of negotiating that kind of agreement. That would devastate union financing, sharply limiting their ability to protect their members and potentially setting up a death spiral as fewer employees would see the benefits of joining (and paying dues to) the unions.&nbsp; Not coincidentally, this would also severely weaken the progressive political organizations and parties that unions have long supported. Movement conservatives have long looked forward to checking that off their &ldquo;to do&rdquo; list.</p>
<p>Alito&rsquo;s determination to re-write federal law in ways that strengthen corporate power and undermine workers&rsquo; rights was also on display a few years earlier, when he wrote an indefensible opinion &mdash;&nbsp;joined by his conservative colleagues &mdash;&nbsp;in <em>Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company</em>. Alito ignored judicial precedent, common sense, and the clear purpose of the law in order to create an unreasonable deadline for making a pay discrimination claim, one that would be insurmountable for someone who was not immediately aware that they were being discriminated against. Lilly Ledbetter, a loyal Goodyear employee who learned she had been paid less than male colleagues for years, was, in the words of law professor and PFAW Foundation Senior Fellow Jamie Raskin, &ldquo;judicial roadkill along the highway in the majority&rsquo;s campaign to restrict, rewrite, and squash anti-discrimination law.&rdquo; Alito also wrote the 5-4 majority opinion in <a href="http://blog.pfaw.org/content/bad-news-workers-supreme-courts-vance-case">last year&rsquo;s <em>Vance v. Ball State </em>decision</a>, which made it easier for companies to avoid liability in discrimination cases by declaring that someone who directs an employee&rsquo;s day-to-day activities doesn&rsquo;t count as a &ldquo;supervisor&rdquo; unless they have power to take &ldquo;tangible employment actions&rdquo; against them like firing them. As in the Ledbetter case, Alito ignored how workplaces really work in order to reach his result.</p>
<p>In <em>Hobby Lobby</em>, the other blockbuster case this week, Alito wrote a decision declaring, for the first time ever, that for-profit corporations have &ldquo;religious exercise&rdquo; rights under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. In order to do so, Alito had to ignore common sense (for-profit corporations don&rsquo;t have religion), to say nothing of the clear historical record and explicit statutory language that RFRA was intended to return the state of the law to the era before the Supreme Court&rsquo;s 1990 decision in <em>Employment Division v. Smith </em>(which many believed undermined protection for religious minorities). In the face of all evidence, Alito argued, in Ginsburg&rsquo;s words, that RFRA was &ldquo;a bold initiative departing from, rather than restoring, pre-Smith jurisprudence.&rdquo;</p>
<p>In an effort reminiscent of the Supreme Court&rsquo;s &ldquo;applies only in this case&rdquo; approach to <em>Bush v. Gore</em>, Alito argued that his ruling was &ldquo;concerned solely with the contraceptive mandate&rdquo; and applied solely to closely held corporations.</p>
<p>Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg didn&rsquo;t let him get away with it, calling Alito&rsquo;s ruling &ldquo;a decision of startling breadth.&rdquo; Having created an entirely new legal avenue by which closely held for-profit companies (which includes about 90 percent of American businesses, hiring more than half of the nation&rsquo;s workforce) can try to evade regulation, Alito has undoubtedly generated excited activity in right-wing legal organizations who are likely to use the ruling to try to claim exemption from anti-discrimination laws for business owners that oppose homosexuality or gender equality, or perhaps for evangelical business owners who believe the Bible opposes minimum wage laws and collective bargaining. And he gave no limiting principle on extending RFRA to for-profit corporations, leaving open the question as to whether an enormous publicly-traded corporation like IBM or GE would also count as a &ldquo;person&rdquo; with religious liberty rights under RFRA.</p>
<p>Alito&rsquo;s insistence that the Court must accept the plaintiff&rsquo;s claim of &ldquo;substantial burden&rdquo; on religious free exercise based on their belief that some forms of contraception cause abortion &mdash;&nbsp;in spite of the consensus of the medical and scientific establishment to the contrary and Justice Ginsburg&rsquo;s explanation of why that belief does not translate into a &ldquo;substantial burden&rdquo;&nbsp;&mdash;&nbsp;was prefigured by an argument he made when working in the Office of Legal Counsel, where he helped write a memo arguing that, in spite of anti-discrimination provisions, employers in federally funded program could exclude people with AIDS regardless of whether or not their &ldquo;fear of contagion&rdquo; was reasonable.</p>
<p>Given that the Hobby Lobby case has been trumpeted by the right as a victory for &ldquo;religious liberty,&rdquo; it is worth noting that, in this year&rsquo;s 5-4 <em>Town of Greece</em> decision, Alito joined his conservative colleagues in a decision that showed little regard for the religious beliefs of citizens of minority faiths whose public town board meetings were consistently begun with sectarian prayers. During consideration of his nomination to the Supreme Court, the editorial page editor of the Atlanta Journal Constitution had <a href="http://articles.baltimoresun.com/2005-12-19/news/0512190086_1_christian-nation-demagogues-secular-democracy">written</a> that Alito would be &ldquo;likely to further erode the protections that have kept the majority from imposing their religious views on the minority.&rdquo;</p>
<p>Alito also joined the Court&rsquo;s 5-4 majority in last year&rsquo;s <a href="http://blog.pfaw.org/content/voting-rights-decision-roberts-rewrites-15th-amendment">decision gutting the Voting Rights Act</a>, another long-pursued goal of the right-wing movement. &nbsp;That decision, in Shelby County v Holder, is another example of the step-by-step shift in the law being pursued by the conservative justices. Shelby was built in part on a 2009 Voting Rights Act decision in which the Court declined to vote on the constitutionality of the provisions they threw out in Shelby, but in which Chief Justice John Roberts included language about &ldquo;constitutional concerns&rdquo; that he would later cite in Shelby. Earlier in his career, Alito made clear that he disagreed with Court decisions that established the crucial &ldquo;one man, one vote&rdquo; principle that undergirds many voting rights protections.</p>
<p>As a Supreme Court justice, Samuel Alito has demonstrated the traits of the right-wing movement from which he emerged: he denounces judicial activism while aggressively pursuing it; he is willing to twist laws, precedents, and established processes in order to advance his political goals; and he has often <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2013/06/justice_samuel_alito_why_he_s_so_rude.html">demonstrated contempt</a> for those who disagree with him, as when he rolled his eyes and shook his head while Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg read her dissent in the <em>Shelby County</em> case.</p>
<p>Much of the initial news coverage of the <em>Hobby Lobby</em> and <em>Harris </em>cases focused on the description of them by their author as being &ldquo;limited&rdquo; rather than &ldquo;sweeping&rdquo; in scope. That ignores the clear evidence from those cases, and from the record of the Roberts court, that Roberts and Alito are playing a long game. They have decades in which to relentlessly push the agenda that has been fostered by right-wing legal and political groups for the past four decades. Their one-step-after-another dismantling of campaign finance law, from <em>Citizens United</em> to <em>McCutcheon</em>, makes it clear that Roberts and Alito see the value of patience and of presenting a public image of restraint while carrying out a revolution. But a revolution they are pursuing, one in which the First Amendment&rsquo;s protections for religious freedom and free speech are <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_breakfast_table/features/2014/scotus_roundup/scotus_end_of_term_the_supreme_court_s_conservatives_are_using_the_first.html">manipulated</a> in the service of undermining religious liberty, the rights of workers, and the ability of the government to regulate corporate behavior.</p>
Peter MontgomeryC4John Roberts Koch BrothersSamuel Alito Supreme CourtSupreme CourtSupreme Court decisionsThe Federalist SocietyFederalist Society Fair and Just CourtsFighting the Right47459Thu, 03 Jul 2014 11:18:00 -0500John Roberts Larry Klayman Is Determined 'To Get The Truth' On Whether Obama Is 'Blackmailing' John Robertshttp://www.pfaw.org/content/larry-klayman-pretty-sure-obama-blackmailing-john-roberts
<img class="imagefield imagefield-field_teaser_astory" width="390" height="250" alt="" src="http://www.pfaw.org/sites/default/files/images/a_story_images/larry_klayman_a.jpg?1352826477" />
<p>Larry Klayman may have absolutely <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/tea-party-nation-wonders-if-john-roberts-was-blackmailed-uphold-health-care-reform">no</a> <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/beck-america-becoming-worse-nazi-germany-and-most-evil-nation-history-world">evidence</a> to prove that President Obama used NSA surveillance to blackmail Chief Justice John Roberts into writing the Supreme Court&rsquo;s decision upholding the Affordable Care Act, but the conservative legal activist claims he is <a href="http://www.wnd.com/2014/05/did-nsa-blackmail-roberts-to-ok-obamacare/"><em>just asking the question</em></a> and pledges to &ldquo;get the truth on this.&rdquo;</p>
<p>And if Obama is (maybe) blackmailing Roberts, Klayman said in an interview with WorldNetDaily radio host Aaron Klein this weekend, then you know <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/larry-klayman-says-revolution-needed-stop-hillary-clinton-winning-presidency-and-destroying-">Hillary Clinton</a> will probably take it to the next level.</p>
<blockquote>
&ldquo;Unfortunately, there&rsquo;s no way to sue the Supreme Court for decisions that it makes. There should be, and there should be a way to remove these justices for making decisions like that,&rdquo; explained Klayman, the founder of Judicial Watch who now heads Freedom Watch.<br />
<br />
&ldquo;But let&rsquo;s take this possibility: Why did Chief Justice Roberts at the eleventh hour change his decision? He was going to side with the other justices and find that Obamacare was unconstitutional. Is it something that was dug up on him by the NSA or the CIA? Was that used against him to blackmail him?<br />
<br />
&ldquo;These are the kinds of things [the government is doing], and that&rsquo;s why it&rsquo;s so scary what&rsquo;s going on with the NSA and the CIA. It can happen in a democracy. So that may help explain it, and perhaps we can reach these issues through the NSA cases that we brought, the NSA/CIA cases. I intend to get the truth on this.&rdquo;<br />
<br />
&hellip;<br />
<br />
&ldquo;If the government wants to destroy you, it has to access the information that it can use to do it, and that&rsquo;s why this is so frightening. [It has] a greater capability than King George III had in 1776. The tyranny is greater today than it was at the time of the American Revolution.&rdquo;<br />
<br />
Regarding the status of the legal cases against government spying, Klayman said, &ldquo;The bottom line is this: Our so-called government is trying to delay final adjudication of the constitutionality of the CIA and NSA&rsquo;s programs, and as a ruse, President Obama is claiming he wants to make modifications to those programs. They&rsquo;re not modifications at all.&rdquo;<br />
<br />
Klayman also said it&rsquo;s not just the Obama administration citizens should be concerned about.<br />
<br />
&ldquo;Can you imagine Hillary Clinton having the power to use this?&rdquo; he asked.</blockquote>
Brian TashmanC4John Roberts Larry Klayman WorldNetDaily Fighting the Right46906Mon, 19 May 2014 16:10:14 -0500John Roberts How Much Congressional Representation Does Billionaire Shaun McCutcheon Have?http://www.pfaw.org/content/how-many-congressmen-does-shaun-mccutcheon-have
<img class="imagefield imagefield-field_teaser_astory" width="390" height="250" alt="" src="http://www.pfaw.org/sites/default/files/images/a_story_images/McCutcheon_Rally.jpg?1396466014" />
<p><em>This post originally appeared on the <a href="http://blog.pfaw.org/content/mccutcheons-talk-constituents-seems-out-place">People For blog</a>.</em></p>
<p>Chief Justice Roberts caps his <a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/13pdf/12-536_e1pf.pdf">opinion</a> in <em><a href="http://blog.pfaw.org/content/supreme-courts-mccutcheon-decision-great-news-billionaires">McCutcheon v. FEC</a></em> by waxing eloquently about the need to ensure that elected officials are responsive to the people. This and other cases have described campaign contributions as a way to promote such responsiveness. But considering that this case is about a non-constituent buying influence in elections across the country, the passage's repeated references to&nbsp;<em>constituents </em>seems strangely out of place:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>For the past 40 years, our campaign finance jurisprudence has focused on the need to preserve authority for the Government to combat corruption, without at the same time compromising the political responsiveness at the heart of the democratic process, or allowing the Government to favor some participants in that process over others. As Edmund Burke explained in his famous speech to the electors of Bristol, a representative owes <strong>constituents </strong>the exercise of his "mature judgment," but judgment informed by "the strictest union, the closest correspondence, and the most unreserved communication <strong>with his constituents</strong>." <strong>Constituents </strong>have the right to support candidates who share their views and concerns. Representatives are not to follow <strong>constituent&nbsp;</strong>orders, but can be expected to be cognizant of and responsive to those concerns. Such responsiveness is key to the very concept of self-governance through elected officials. (emphasis added, internal citations removed)</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Shaun McCutcheon &ndash; whose contributions are at issue in this case &ndash; told the Court that he wanted to make contributions of $1,776 to each of more than two dozen different congressional candidates (as well as to various party committees) during the 2012 election cycle. It seems unlikely that he could have been a constituent of more than two dozen different members of Congress.</p>
<p>Obviously, people have a First Amendment right to participate in congressional races outside of where they live. But a stirring paragraph about political responsiveness to&nbsp;<em>constituents </em>hardly seems appropriate in a case that is all about political responsiveness to non-constituents.</p>
Paul GordonC4John Roberts McCutcheon v. FECSupreme CourtFighting the Right46351Wed, 02 Apr 2014 16:20:28 -0500John Roberts Supreme Court's McCutcheon Decision Is Great News For Billionaireshttp://www.pfaw.org/content/supreme-courts-mccutcheon-decision-great-news-billionaires-0
<img class="imagefield imagefield-field_teaser_astory" width="390" height="250" alt="" src="http://www.pfaw.org/sites/default/files/images/a_story_images/Supreme_Court_A.jpg?1330022185" />
<p><em>This post originally appeared on the <a href="http://blog.pfaw.org/content/supreme-courts-mccutcheon-decision-great-news-billionaires">People For blog</a>.</em></p>
<p>The Supreme Court's <em>McCutcheon</em> opinion, released this morning, is another 5-4 body blow to our democracy. To justify striking down limits that cap aggregate campaign contributions during a single election cycle, the Roberts Court ignores the way the world really works and makes it far more difficult to justify much-needed protections against those who would purchase our elections and elected officials.</p>
<p>Americans are deeply concerned that control of our elections and our government is being usurped by a tiny sliver of extremely wealthy and powerful individuals (and the corporations they control). That is not the democracy that our Constitution established and protects. The enormous impact of money in politics can destroy a democracy, undermining its foundations by disconnecting elected officials from the people they are supposed to serve and eroding the trust of the people in their system of government.</p>
<p>But the Roberts Court today stressed that campaign contributions can be justified under the First Amendment only if they address "quid pro quo" corruption &ndash; i.e. bribery &ndash; despite contrary pre-<em>Citizens United</em> holdings with a broader and more realistic vision. A democratic system rotting at its core &ndash; a government of, by, and for the wealthy &ndash; is not corrupt in their eyes.</p>
<p>If a wealthy person gives millions of dollars to a party (distributed to the party's multiple candidates and PACs across the country), he clearly exercises enormous influence over the laws that get passed. What the voters want becomes far less relevant, because it's the billionaire whose money is vital to getting elected. A government where elected officials allow a few plutocrats to have enormous access and influence over their policies is not an indication of a healthy government of, by, and for the people.</p>
<p>As Justice Breyer write in his <em>McCutcheon </em>dissent:</p>
<blockquote>
Today a majority of the Court overrules this holding [Buckley's 1976 upholding of aggregate limits]. It is wrong to do so. Its conclusion rests upon its own, not a record-based, view of the facts. Its legal analysis is faulty: It misconstrues the nature of the competing constitutional interests at stake. It understates the importance of protecting the political integrity of our governmental institutions. It creates a loophole that will allow a single individual to contribute millions of dollars to a political party or to a candidate's campaign. Taken together with Citizens United v. Federal Election Comm'n, 558 U. S. 310 (2010), today's decision eviscerates our Nation's campaign finance laws, leaving a remnant incapable of dealing with the grave problems of democratic legitimacy that those laws were intended to resolve.</blockquote>
<p>Americans are organizing around the country to restore our democracy in light of <em>Citizens United</em> and other dangerous court opinions. Today's McCutcheon opinion gives us another reason to rally.</p>
<p>Last year, <a href="http://www.pfaw.org/press-releases/2013/09/edit-memo-blockbuster-case-kicks-new-supreme-court-term-mccutcheon-steamrolle">People For the American Way Foundation released an analysis of <em>McCutcheon</em></a> within the context of the Supreme Court's past rulings on campaign finance.</p>
Paul GordonC4Citizens UnitedJohn Roberts McCutcheon v. FECSupreme CourtFighting the Right46347Wed, 02 Apr 2014 14:05:35 -0500John Roberts Tea Party Nation Wonders if John Roberts was 'Blackmailed' to Uphold Health Care Reformhttp://www.pfaw.org/content/tea-party-nation-wonders-if-john-roberts-was-blackmailed-uphold-health-care-reform
<img class="imagefield imagefield-field_teaser_astory" width="390" height="250" alt="" src="http://www.pfaw.org/sites/default/files/images/a_story_images/tea_party_4_a.jpg?1355957002" />
<p>Tea Party Nation president Judson Phillips sent members an email this morning entitled: &lsquo;Was Chief Justice John Roberts Blackmailed To Support ObamaCare?&rsquo; Obviously, we had to check this out, and lo and behold it links to a tea party message board <a href="http://www.libertycaucus.net/forum/index.php?PHPSESSID=1e9219842f26c3a8f0c8a656d733e81e&topic=113.msg688#msg688">post</a> about how Chief Justice Roberts changed his decision on the health care reform law after he was &ldquo;blackmailed&rdquo; by President Obama as part of an illegal adoption and child trafficking scheme.</p>
<blockquote>
It is now quite evident that the two Children were from Ireland. Even wikipedia references these adoptions at the time of Roberts' confirmation, and indicates that the children were of Irish birth.<br />
<br />
However Irish law 1) prohibits the adoption of Children to non-residents, and 2) also does not permit private adoptions, but rather has all adoptions go through a public agency.<br />
<br />
Evidently Roberts arranged for this adoption through some sort of trafficking agency, that got the children out of Ireland and into that Latin American country, from which they were adopted, thereby circumventing two Irish laws -- entirely illegal, but perhaps quasi-legitimized by the birth mothers (two) transporting the children out of Ireland.<br />
<br />
Undoubtedly Roberts and his wife spent a great deal of money for this illegal process, circumventing Irish laws and arranging for the transit of two Irish children from separate birth-mothers to a foreign nation. Come 2012, those two children have been with the Roberts' for roughly 10 years, since they were adopted as "infants".<br />
<br />
&hellip;<br />
<br />
Roberts is not deserving of any sort of respect here, and is only the latest example of people in position believing themselves above the law, beyond scrutiny and exempt from repercussion.<br />
<br />
It all now makes sense.<br />
<br />
The circumstances of these two adoptions explain not only why this would be overlooked by an overall sympathetic media, but also why a sitting Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court would not want this information to become public fodder well into his tenure. Its release and public discussion would discredit Roberts as an impartial judge of the law, and undoubtedly lead to his impeachment.<br />
<br />
This also explains why Roberts would have a means to be blackmailed, and why that leverage would still exist even after the institution of ObamaCare.<br />
<br />
... And it has led to flipping the swing-vote on ObamaCare, which fundamentally changed the relationship between citizen and government, making us de facto property of the state, with our relative worth in care and maintenance able to be determined by the government. Essentially it was a coup without firing a shot, much less needing even an Amendment to the Constitution.<br />
<br />
And it is consistent with Obama's Chicago-style politics, that has previously involved opening other sealed <divorce> records in order to win election.</divorce></blockquote>
Brian Tashmanhealth care reformJohn Roberts Judson PhillipsSCOTUSTea Party NationC3Fighting the Right42175Mon, 11 Feb 2013 12:45:08 -0500John Roberts Kuhner: 'Judas' John Roberts Ushered in 'The End of our Constitutional Republic'http://www.pfaw.org/content/kuhner-judas-john-roberts-end-constitutional-republic
<p>Washington Times columnist and Edmund Burke Institute president Jeffrey Kuhner doesn&rsquo;t seem too happy with the Supreme Court&rsquo;s decision to uphold the health care reform law, <a href="http://www.janetmefferdpremium.com/2012/07/10/janet-mefferd-radio-show-20120710-hr-3/">telling Janet Mefferd yesterday</a> that the ruling &ldquo;signals the end of our Constitutional republic as we know it&rdquo; and &ldquo;the end of traditional America as we know it.&rdquo; &ldquo;We are now living in an age of a creeping, soft, socialist tyranny,&rdquo; Kuhner warned, even alleging that the government can potentially mandate that people stop &ldquo;using toilet paper because it&rsquo;s bad for the environment.&rdquo; He argued that Chief Justice John Roberts &ldquo;is a Judas&rdquo; who &ldquo;did it for his thirty pieces of silver&rdquo; in the form of favorable reactions from the media:</p>
<p align="center"><embed width="400" height="20" src="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/sites/default/files/mp3/player.swf" bgcolor="undefined" allowscriptaccess="always" allowfullscreen="true" flashvars="file=/sites/default/files/mp3/Kuhner Judas John Roberts.mp3"></embed></p>
<blockquote> <strong>Kuhner</strong>: Today it&rsquo;s going to be health insurance, tomorrow it&rsquo;ll be eating broccoli or buying an electric car or not using toilet paper because it&rsquo;s bad for the environment. There is now no end; there is no limit on the power of the central government. That&rsquo;s why it&rsquo;s an ominous precedent, it&rsquo;s a revolutionary precedent; I believe it signals the end of our Constitutional republic as we know it, we are now living in an age of a creeping, soft, socialist tyranny. This election I believe is the last chance for the American people to now stop Obamacare, stop the government takeover of healthcare, to stop this out of control imperial presidency, and to save our republic. After the next election, Obamacare will be fully implemented, the precedent of the Supreme Court will now be established and it will be the end of traditional America as we know it.<br />
<br />
<strong>Mefferd</strong>: It&rsquo;s interesting, when Obama has been issuing these executive orders, a lot of people have accused him rightly I believe of being confused of what his branch of government is supposed to do, do you believe that Roberts superseded his branch of government? He&rsquo;s the judicial branch. Do you think he was doing something beyond the authority of the court to start saying alaw is this and not this regardless of what was argued? <br />
<br />
<strong>Kuhner</strong>: Yes. In fact, I&rsquo;m going to be very candid with you and I&rsquo;m not going to mince words, I believe Chief Justice Roberts is a Judas. And I believe like Judas he did it for his thirty pieces of silver. And what were his thirty pieces of silver? It was one puff profile piece after another. <br />
</blockquote>Brian TashmanC4health carehealth care reformJanet MefferdJeffrey KuhnerJohn Roberts Washington Times Fighting the Right40407Wed, 11 Jul 2012 10:15:46 -0500John Roberts Larry Klayman Wonders if John Roberts was 'Bribed or Blackmailed' into Upholding Health Care Reformhttp://www.pfaw.org/content/larry-klayman-john-roberts-bribed-blackmailed-health-care-reform
<p>Unable to comprehend why Chief Justice John Roberts found the health care reform law to be constitutional, Judicial Watch founder Larry Klayman is now <a href="http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/klayman/120708">calling for an investigation</a> into whether &ldquo;whether Roberts was bribed or blackmailed into precipitously turning tail and casting his lot with the socialists.&rdquo; Maybe the money came from Iran, as Klayman <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/tea-party-nation-wonders-if-obama-staged-bin-laden-death-gave-drone-iran">earlier claimed</a> that &ldquo;Iran has paid off Obama with campaign contributions to win the next election.&rdquo;</p>
<blockquote> What explains Chief Justice Roberts' conversion from one who had decided to strike down Obamacare to a justice who dishonestly twisted and perverted the law to uphold it as constitutional? Was it simply a desire, as some political and legal pundits have speculated, to allegedly "save" the institution of the court by caving in to the left &mdash; which in recent years had railed against the conservative majority &mdash; and kissing the derriere of President Obama himself? In this way was Chief Justice Roberts painting "his" court as the court for all people, be they left, right, black or white ? Or was it something more sinister? Given real-world realities, you have to ask whether Roberts was bribed or blackmailed into precipitously turning tail and casting his lot with the socialists. <br />
<br />
Decades ago, no rational person would have even dared to think such a thought. But with each passing decade since the 1950s &mdash; which it now appears were the pinnacle in America's post-war rise to power and greatness &mdash; the ethics, morals and honesty of our public officials in particular have decayed into the slimy free fall the nation now finds itself in. So why is this such a far-fetched proposition? <br />
<br />
Was Chief Justice Roberts was bribed, blackmailed or just playing political games with his Obamacare change of heart? As the old proverb goes, "Where there is smoke there is usually fire." Since judges and, in this case, justices should not be treated as royalty, and certainly are not above the law, is it not reasonable for Roberts to be thoroughly investigated over his lawless actions? <br />
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Instead, it again turns to We the People to investigate and, if Chief Justice Roberts was bribed or blackmailed, mete out justice. As I have been writing about in recent weeks, one way to do this is through the Citizens Grand Jury, which our Founding Fathers bequeathed to us to use in trying times like these. </blockquote>Brian TashmanC4John Roberts Larry Klayman Fighting the Right40383Mon, 09 Jul 2012 12:00:52 -0500John Roberts The Irony of Bryan Fischer Calling the SCOTUS Ruling 'Absolutely Irrational [and] Illogical'http://www.pfaw.org/content/irony-bryan-fischer-calling-scotus-ruling-absolutely-irrational-and-illogical
<p>Bryan Fischer has not been reluctant to <a href="http://www.afa.net/Blogs/BlogPost.aspx?id=2147523501">voice his hatred</a> of&nbsp; the Supreme Court's ruling upholding the constitutionality of health care reform, calling it "<a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/fischer-roberts-health-care-ruling-makes-you-wonder-if-something-has-gone-wrong-his-brain">legal garbage</a>" and total gibberish that signals the end of America.</p>
<p>On <a href="http://www.afa.net/Radio/show.aspx?id=2147490466&tab=audio&audio=2147523557">Friday's radio program</a>, Fischer continued the assault, declaring that the decision written by Chief Justice John Roberts was so fundamentally illogical and irrational that there must be something was wrong with his brain, perhaps rooted in the fact that Roberts takes medication for epilepsy:</p>
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<p>Fischer has spent three days absolutely tearing apart this ruling and blasting it as utterly incoherent and unconstitutional, and then began attacking Chief Justice Roberts for supposedly changing sides at the last minute ... just like Justice Anthony Kennedy did during Roe v Wade:</p>
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<p>[Roberts] ruling was absolutely irrational, it's absolutely illogical, it is absolutely unconstitutional, and it is so bad it will make your eyes water trying to make sense of it. And it's my position that ruling doesn't even make sense; you couldn't even imagine a world, you couldn't even create a parallel universe in which this ruling could make any kind of sense.</p>
<p>Now Roberts apparently switched his vote very late in the game. This happened on <em>Roe v Wade</em>, by the way - Anthony Kennedy originally was going to be against <em>Roe v Wade</em> [but] somebody got to him. So the first vote on <em>Roe v Wade</em> was to uphold the pro-life position, sanctity of life was going to be protected by the Court. But over the course of the month between when the first vote was taken and when the opinions were written, Anthony Kennedy switched teams, he went over to the dark side of the force. So they had to change and so the majority opinion became the one that struck down <em>Roe v Wade</em> and made abortion legal in all nine months of pregnancy.</p>
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<p>Hmmm, apparently Fischer is such a scholar that he knows that Roberts' opinion is incoherent nonsense and totally unconstitutional .... but doesn't realize that <em>Roe v Wade</em> was <a href="http://www.oyez.org/cases/1970-1979/1971/1971_70_18">decided in 1973</a> on a vote of 7-2 and that Kennedy didn't <a href="http://supreme.lp.findlaw.com/supreme_court/justices/kennedy.html">join the Court until 1988</a> or that there as never been a "majority opinion ... that struck down <em>Roe v Wade</em>."</p>Kyle MantylaAmerican Family Association Bryan FischerJohn Roberts SCOTUSC3Fighting the Right40337Mon, 02 Jul 2012 10:02:15 -0500John Roberts Rick Joyner's Hellish Attack on Chief Justice John Robertshttp://www.pfaw.org/content/rick-joyners-hellish-attack-chief-justice-john-roberts
<p>As Kyle has been <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/supreme-court-upholds-health-care-reform-reactions-right">documenting</a>, there is no shortage of rhetorical excess from right-wing leaders upset about the Supreme Court upholding the Affordable Care Act.&nbsp; But the response from Rick Joyner, head of MorningStar Ministries and the dominionist Oak Initiative, has to be among the most unhinged. Joyner has a <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/category/people/rick-joyner ">penchant </a>for apocalyptic rhetoric, warning of demonic threats and natural disasters facing an unrepentant America. <br />
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Joyner is embraced by other right-wing leaders, appearing at the Awakening conferences organized by the Liberty Counsel and the Freedom Federation, a Religious Right super-group of which Joyner&rsquo;s organization is a member.&nbsp; Sen. Jim DeMint <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/demint-god-has-put-christians-charge-vineyard-we-call-america ">spoke </a>earlier this month at a &ldquo;Freedom Congress&rdquo; organized by Joyner. <br />
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In a<a href="http://www.theoakinitiative.org/special-bulletin-12-2012 "> &ldquo;special bulletin&rdquo;</a> appropriately titled &ldquo;Dazed and Confused,&rdquo; Joyner goes after Chief Justice John Roberts with literally hellish relish.&nbsp; Roberts&rsquo; reasoning, he says, &ldquo;could potentially open the biggest gate of hell into our nation and culture by the Supreme Court since Roe v. Wade&rdquo; and &ldquo;has potentially released the most evil hounds from hell against the American people.&rdquo;<br />
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Joyner even suggests that Roberts is, quite literally, on drugs:</p>
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<p>It is understandable that some are now making the assertion that Chief Justice Roberts&rsquo; medication used to control his epilepsy has taken a toll on his mental abilities and reasoning. Nothing else has come forward as an adequate explanation for why he would be the one to free Obamacare like he did to become the biggest grab of totalitarian power over America in history.</p>
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<p>&ldquo;This decision,&rdquo; says Joyner, &ldquo;has deepened our national crisis, and jeopardized our Constitution at a most inopportune and dangerous time.&rdquo;</p>
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<p>It now seems that the American Republic is under unrelenting attack from every possible direction. Let us not faint, but keep in mind that the greatest victories only come when there are great battles. No doubt this will wake up many more Americans to the battle we are in. Great souls run to the sound of battle, not away from it. America still has many great souls who will fight regardless of the odds against them, and who will stand and never surrender for the sake of the freedom that was their birthright. This Supreme Court Decision has only increased the volume of the alarm and we can expect many more to hear it now.</p>
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<p>Joyner had much kinder words for Mitt Romney, quoting the candidate&rsquo;s response to the ruling and his &ldquo;resolve&rdquo; to repeal the health care reform law.</p>Peter Montgomeryhealth care reformJim DeMint John Roberts MorningStar MinistriesOak InitiativeRick JoynerSupreme CourtC3Fighting the Right40332Fri, 29 Jun 2012 15:44:34 -0500John Roberts Fischer: Roberts' Health Care Ruling 'Makes you Wonder if Something has Gone Wrong with his Brain'http://www.pfaw.org/content/fischer-roberts-health-care-ruling-makes-you-wonder-if-something-has-gone-wrong-his-brain
<p>While <a href="http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/supreme-court-upholds-health-care-reform-reactions-right">collecting reactions</a> from the Religious Right to yesterday's ruling upholding health care reform legislation, one person we didn't include was Bryan Fischer since we were waiting until his <a href="http://www.afa.net/Radio/show.aspx?id=2147490466&tab=video&video=2147523476">radio program aired</a> to see just how outraged he was over the ruling.</p>
<p>And was he ever outraged, kicking off his program <a href="http://youtu.be/ON7aTAqZrcc">by declaring</a> that "America no longer exists as a constitutional republic," suggesting that the authors of the decision ought to be impeached, questioning Chief Justice John Roberts' sanity, and calling the decision "legal garbage" that should be tossed in a landfill and left to rot:</p>
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<p>Ladies and gentlemen, today the Grim Reaper has visited the United States. Unless this Supreme Court decision from today is repealed, unless it is overturned, unless it is repealed, America no longer exists as a constitutional republic and Chief Justice John Roberts will do down in history as the man who shredded the Constitution beyond recognition. His ruling today is unconscionable, it's inexcusable for somebody who has taken an oath to uphold the Constitution of the United States to issue a ruling like John Roberts issued today.</p>
<p>This is bad behavior. All five of the judges that participated in this ruling could be impeached, tried, convicted, and removed from office. This is a gross dereliction of duty on their part.</p>
<p>I mean, John Roberts, ladies and gentlemen, this is embarrassing. John Roberts today participated and wrote legal gobbledygook, it is legal gibberish, it is irrational, it makes absolutely no sense. Not only is it unconstitutional, it's not even rational what he wrote in his opinion that is going to take away the freedom of million and million and million of Americans. It actually makes you wonder if something has gone wrong with his brain. He's not thinking clearly, he's not writing clearly.</p>
<p>The main ruling is just garbage, I mean it is legal garbage, ladies and gentlemen. That's the most polite term I can use to describe what John Roberts has written. It is legal garbage. It belongs in a landfill somewhere where it can be left to rot and decompose and decay in peace. That's how bad it is.</p>
</blockquote>Kyle MantylaAmerican Family Association Bryan FischerJohn Roberts SCOTUSC3Fair and Just CourtsFighting the Right40326Fri, 29 Jun 2012 11:01:51 -0500John Roberts